Amazon Kindle Fire HD: The new 7- and 8-inch Android tablets

Amazon has announced the follow-up to the Kindle Fire, the aptly named Kindle Fire HD, at an event in Santa Monica on Thursday.

The new model, which sports a similar design to the previous Kindle Fire, will come with either a 7-inch or 8.9-inch screen, and look to take on the iPad.

Focusing on the power of the screen, it will feature a 1920 x 1200 resolution screen with a 254ppi. Amazon has also added a polarizing filter in an attempt to cut down glare for those who want to use it in daylight.

In a move to highlight the Apple iPad's single speaker, Amazon has said that the Kindle Fire HD comes with Dolby Digital Plus stereo speakers. It will also have two Wi-Fi antennas to help boost Wi-Fi performance around your home.

Storage-wise, you will get options from 16GB.

On the software side of things it's a slightly changed interface with some new tricks, the most exciting of which for parents is Kindle FreeTime. The feature lets you set different time limits for different kinds of content for your kids. Books? Unlimited. Games and TV? Limited.

Other software features include X-Ray for Movies, Immersion Reading, and Whispersync for Games a service that like Apple iCloud syncing would allow games developers to store game progress in the cloud.

X-Ray for Movies, just like X-Ray for books is a feature that uses the Internet Movie Database (IMDB) to name the actors for you while you are watching the movies.

On the measurements front it will measure 8.8mm thick and weigh 566g.

The 7-inch Kindle Fire HD will cost $199, while the 8.9-inch model will cost $299 and ships on 20 November.

There will also be a 4G LTE version for $499. It will come only with a 8.9-inch screen and 32GB of storage. For a subscription of $50 a year Amazon will offer the Amazon Kindle Fire HD 4G LTE users 250MB of data a month 20GB of cloud storage, and a $10 store credit card.

Amazon has yet to confirm whether they will be available internationally.

Stuart has been a tech journalist since 1998 and written for a number of publications around the world. Regularly turning up on television, radio and in newspapers, Stuart has played with virtually every gadget available.